No Arabic abstract
We report our measurements for orbital and spin parameters of X 1822-371 using its X-ray partial eclipsing profile and pulsar timing from data collected by the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer (RXTE). Four more X-ray eclipse times obtained by the RXTE 2011 observations were combined with historical records to trace evolution of orbital period. We found that a cubic ephemeris likely better describes evolution of the X-ray eclipse times during a time span of about 34 years with a marginal second order derivative of $ddot{P}_{orb}=(-1.05 pm 0.59) times 10^{-19}$ s$^{-1}$. Using the pulse arrival time delay technique, the orbital and spin parameters were obtained from RXTE observations from 1998 to 2011. The detected pulse periods show that the neutron star in X 1822-371 is continuously spun-up with a rate of $dot{P}_{s}=(-2.6288 pm 0.0095) times 10^{-12}$ s s$^{-1}$. Evolution of the epoch of the mean longitude $l=pi /2$ (i.e. $T_{pi / 2}$) gives an orbital period derivative value consistent with that obtained from the quadratic ephemeris evaluated by the X-ray eclipse but the detected $T_{pi / 2}$ values are significantly and systematically earlier than the corresponding expected X-ray eclipse times by $90 pm 11$ s. This deviation is probably caused by asymmetric X-ray emissions. We also attempted to constrain the mass and radius of the neutron star using the spin period change rate and concluded that the intrinsic luminosity of X 1822-371 is likely more than $10^{38}$ ergs s$^{-1}$.
The X-ray source 4U 1822-371 is an eclipsing low-mass X-ray binary and X-ray pulsar, hosting a NS that shows periodic pulsations in the X-ray band. The inclination angle of the system is so high that in principle, it should be hard to observe both the direct thermal emission of the central object and the reflection component of the spectrum because they are hidden by the outer edge of the accretion disc. Assuming that the source accretes at the Eddington limit, we analysed non-simultaneous XMM-Newton and NuSTAR observations and studied the average broadband spectrum, with the aim to investigate the presence of a reflection component. No such component has been observed before in a high-inclination source such as 4U 1822-371. We modelled the spectral emission of the source using two different reflection models, Diskline plus Pexriv and the self-consistent model RfxConv. In our analysis, we find significant evidence of a reflection component in the spectrum, in addition to two lines associated with neutral or mildly ionised iron. The continuum spectrum is well fitted by a saturated Comptonisation model and a thermal black-body component emitted by the accretion disc at a lower temperature. We updated the ephemeris, adding two new eclipse times to the most recent ephemeris reported in literature. In our proposed scenario, the source is accreting at the Eddington limit with an intrinsic luminosity of $10^{38}$ erg/s, while the observed luminosity is two orders of magnitude lower. Despite the high inclination, we find that a reflection component is required to fit residuals at the Fe line range and the hard excess observed in the spectrum. The best-fit value of the inner disc radius is still uncertain and model dependent. More observations are therefore needed to confirm these results, which can give important information on this enigmatic and peculiar source.
The low mass X-ray binary 2A 1822-371 is an eclipsing system with an accretion disc corona and with an orbital period of 5.57 hr. The primary is an 0.59 s X-ray pulsar with a proposed strong magnetic field of 10^10-10^12 G. In this paper we study the spin evolution of the pulsar and constrain the geometry of the system. We find that, contrary to previous claims, a thick corona is not required, and that the system characteristics could be best explained by a thin accretion outflow due to a super-Eddington mass transfer rate and a geometrically thick inner accretion flow. The orbital, spectral and timing observations can be reconciled in this scenario under the assumption that the mass transfer proceeds on a thermal timescale which would make 2A 1822-371, a mildly super-Eddington source viewed at high inclination angles. The timing analysis on 13 years of RXTE data show a remarkably stable spin-up that implies that 2A 1822-371, might quickly turn into a millisecond pulsar in the next few thousand years.
The source X 1822-371 is an eclipsing compact binary system with a period close to 5.57 hr and an orbital period derivative $dot{P}_{rm orb}$ of 1.51(7)$times 10^{-10}$ s s$^{-1}$. The very large value of $dot{P}_{rm orb}$ is compatible with a super-Eddington mass transfer rate from the companion star, as suggested by X-ray and optical data. The XMM-Newton observation taken in 2017 allows us to update the orbital ephemeris and verify whether the orbital period derivative has been stable over the last 40 yr. We added to the X-ray eclipse arrival times from 1977 to 2008 two new values obtained from the RXTE and XMM-Newton observations performed in 2011 and 2017, respectively. We estimated the number of orbital cycles and the delays of our eclipse arrival times spanning 40 yr using as reference time the eclipse arrival time obtained from the Rossi-XTE observation taken in 1996. Fitting the delays with a quadratic model, we found an orbital period $P_{rm orb}=5.57062957(20)$ hr and a $dot{P}_{rm orb}$ value of $1.475(54) times 10^{-10}$ s s$^{-1}$. The addition of a cubic term to the model does not significantly improve the quality of the fit. We also determined a spin-period value of $P_{rm spin}=0.5915669(4)$ s and its first derivative $dot{P}_{rm spin}= -2.595(11) times 10^{-12}$ s s$^{-1}$. The obtained results confirm the scenario of a super-Eddington mass transfer rate; we also exclude a gravitational coupling between the orbit and the change in the oblateness of the companion star triggered by the nuclear luminosity of the companion star.
In this paper, we report on the available X-ray data collected by INTEGRAL, Swift, and XMM-Newton during the first outburst of the INTEGRAL transient IGR J17451-3022, discovered in 2014 August. The monitoring observations provided by the JEM-X instruments on-board INTEGRAL and the Swift/XRT showed that the event lasted for about 9 months and that the emission of the source remained soft for the entire period. The source emission is dominated by a thermal component (kT~1.2 keV), most likely produced by an accretion disk. The XMM-Newton observation carried out during the outburst revealed the presence of multiple absorption features in the soft X-ray emission that could be associated to the presence of an ionized absorber lying above the accretion disk, as observed in many high-inclination low mass X-ray binaries. The XMM-Newton data also revealed the presence of partial and rectangular X-ray eclipses (lasting about 820 s), together with dips. The latter can be associated with increases in the overall absorption column density in the direction of the source. The detection of two consecutive X-ray eclipses in the XMM-Newton data allowed us to estimate the source orbital period at 22620.5(-1.8,+2.0) s (1{sigma} c.l.).
Results of a 1997 September 9-10 BeppoSAX observation of the 5.57 hr low-mass X-ray binary (LMXRB) X1822-371 are presented. The 0.3-40 keV spectrum is unusually complex and cannot be fit by any of the standard models applied to other LMXRB. At least two components are required. One component has a shape consistent with that expected from the Comptonization of an input soft (Wein) spectrum while the other, contributing ~40% of the 1-10 keV flux, is consistent with being a blackbody. In addition, there is a ``dip in the spectrum which can be modeled by a 1.33 +0.05 -0.11 keV absorption edge with an optical depth, tau, of 0.28 +/- 0.06. If the same model is fit to ASCA Solid-State Imaging Spectrometer spectra obtained in 1993 and 1996, then reasonable fits are also obtained, with a similar absorption feature required. The nature of this feature is highly uncertain; its energy corresponds to the K-edges of highly ionized Ne x and neutral Mg, or to an L-edge of moderately ionized Fe. Surprisingly, no strong (tau > 0.05) Fe-K or (tau > 0.18) O-K edges are visible. The folded lightcurve of X1822-371 is similar to previous observations, except that no strong softening is seen near the eclipse. An updated orbital ephemeris is provided.